How to Interpret Tire Wear

Video Transcript

"Alright in this clip we're going to teach you how to interpret the wear on a tire. There's a lot of circumstances that can actually affect how a tire wears, whether it wears evenly across the tread pattern, more so to the outside, more so to the inside or more so down the middle of the tire. There's also what's called chopping or irregular wear where you get a wave pattern on the outside or the inside of a tire. Wave pattern on the outside or the inside of a tire can be caused by one of two things. Balance issue or how a tire is assembled as far as if it's heavier on one side than it is on the other, can cause a tire to bounce as it goes down the road and you get these little wave patterns, so a high low, high low pitch on the inside or the outside. The other thing that can affect that is what's called tow. If a vehicle driving down the road and the tires are pointed in, that's more tow in. If the vehicle's driving down the road and the tires are pointed slightly out, that's more tow out. Tow out in this particular scenario; if you were driving down the road and this tire were actually pointed in this direction, the tow out meaning the first contact you would get on the road, would be the inside of the tire so you would get a wave pattern on the inside. If it were tow in, you'd get just the opposite, you'd get a wave pattern on the outside of the tire because the first contact point on the road would be the outside of the tire. Now if you got a smooth wear, more so on the outside of the tire, that would actually mean that the top of the tire is tilted outward a little bit. That's called camber. The camber will actually point the outside of the tire outwards. If it were cambered in, you would get more so on the inside or the top of the tire leaning towards the inside of the car, wearing the inside of the tire out. If it's worn evenly on both the inside and the outside, you have more tread on the center of the tire, that's usually due to under-inflation, meaning that the tire's bowing slightly as it touches the ground. So you get a contact patch that's more on the outside and the inside but you're not wearing the center. If you wear out the center of the tire first, it's usually due to over-inflation or the tire has too much air pressure and so it, causing it to bulge out and you just touch the center of the tread as you drive down the road. Now an important thing to note, all tires have what is called a wear bar that will show you when it's about time to consider replacing a tire. Notice on this particular tire the wear bar is just starting to become even with the actual tread of the tire. A brand new tire should be sticking up considerably and this wear bar sitting down considerably, meaning you've got tread left on your tire. But on this tire, it's about time for a replacement. But it did wear considerably even across both the inside and outside and the center of the tread."